The “privilege of pacifism”, esp. regarding blacks and black trans women

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See [this](https://i.imgur.com/PgMgidM.png)

How is being able to turn the other cheek privilege? *Assuming it is*. This is not a political/social debate of *whether it is*. I want the reasoning behind the statement.

In: Culture

5 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

Because depending on what part of the country you live in you get the fucking shit best out of you if you’re openly gay or trans. Secondly, the police are statistically much more likely to escalate to deadly force if you’re a black man.

Anonymous 0 Comments

If I turn the other cheek as a cute white chick it usually only goes but so far, and I can usually run to people bigger and more powerful than me to help if something gets really bad.

If you don’t fit the traditional image of someone society wants to protect, you just die.

So if I go to a bar and a random dude tries to snatch me up, there’s fairly good odds I can get him removed so I can enjoy my night in peace. The more he harasses me my odds of having others intervene on my behalf go up a lot. But I look kinda like a tall busty KStew, so I have a lot of features that the society I live in considers desirable and worth protecting.

If I were a black chick, or a black trans girl, or even just had less features our society desires, like say I was fat or particularly assymetrical, they still might intervene on my behalf, but they’d be less likely to. They’d still be more likely to intervene as someone harassed me more and more, but still not as much as they are with me as a “pretty” white chick. I’d have to fight back right away or the people around me might just let a fucker murder me.

TLDR If I turn the other cheek most of the time someone sticks up for me eventually. If I tried to do that without privilege, I’d be dead.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Its a complex issue but the very basic version is: If people are threatening you (even implicitly) and those same people have the power to do so, you don’t really have the option to just tell them not to or treat them peacefully and expect them to suddenly have a change of heart. If there’s no threat, you have the privilege of being in a position to treat others however you want (peacefully for example) without anyone being reasonably able to take advantage of that

To further illustrate: if a person living in early 1940s Germany was a straight Caucasian Christian, they had a privilege of being peaceful if the Nazis showed up at their door. Jewish people however, would have to fight or risk imprisonment in a concentration camp, or even death. There was no chance to reason with them

Anonymous 0 Comments

You can afford to be a pacifist if you aren’t actually facing any threat.

You can’t afford to be a pacifist if others are looking to physically harm you or kill you.

Anonymous 0 Comments

Not everone is in the position to just “take it”. Trans people are actively being targeted and need to push for systemic change. Black people cant just accept the society how it is. The oppressed have to push society forwards in order to survive. To be able to just accept society with how it is, requires you to somewhat be accepted in society.